Home Decor – Page 17

Our home reno project du jour

May 16, 2007 by Tricia

I’m starting to get into that renovation mode again. Chris and I have been working on our house since the very first day that we got it. On the second day in our home we were taking out all of the wall to wall carpeting and knocking down three of the walls that sectioned off the living room dining room. We mean business when we get busy renovating!

A few weeks ago I bought a new domain that I might move my gardening blog over to at some point. Whether I do or don’t it’s going to be a Home and Garden blog and I’ll be talking about decor, interior design, home renovation as well as my love of gardening on that site. I haven’t done a thing with it but it will be located at homeandgardendiva.com.

We’ve taken photos of our projects as we’ve been doing them – again from day one. So I’m sure I’ll have lots of photos of our work on the new site. You’ve got to see our living room and dining room walls! I did them myself in Venetian plaster. I worked 18 hours a day for three weeks straight to finish 600 square feet of wall in a tri color venetian plaster of my own mix.

The walls are a lovely shade of yellow with light yellow and off white mixed in. Venetian plaster looks quite a bit like marble and it’s got a sheen to it from all the hand polishing I did when I did the job. I don’t have any photos on this computer or in my flickr account that do it justice right now. I’ll have to take some tomorrow and possibly add them to this post. However, it has a real Mediterranean or European feel to it like that of the Tuscany Villas. It’s beautiful.

The furniture in our Dining room is all antique, and our living room has a much more modern tech feel with our HDTV and leather couches and recliner. The walls pull it all together and make it look amazing. All we have to do in the room now is get the molding and our beautiful tin ceiling up!

Honest, I think that when I do eventually show you guys photos of our living room / dining room you’ll love it. The styles that I’ve put together are all different and I’m sure that it might not sound like it goes together as well as I’m telling you that it does, but just you wait. I’ll show you photos one day and you’ll see what I mean.

All we have to do is finish this job! I’m glad I’m starting to get into the mood to do it again. Oh and I’ve come up with a bribe for Chris too. He really wants to get a very expensive piece of equipment for his guitar. It’s about $500 but it has to be install into his guitar. It’s a special pick up if you want to know. His acoustic guitar does have a nice pick up but he wants to replace it with this deluxe one and put the old pick up in another guitar – another installation charge! I figure it will cost about $700 bucks to get this all done. My deal with him is that if he does go ahead and get this for his guitar we have to get started on our living room dining room project again – and get it done by sometime this summer. I think it’ll work.

Looking for glass door knobs

April 27, 2007 by Tricia

Does anyone else have an older home that they are renovating? We’ve stalled on our projects so I’m living in a house that’s half done. I hope we get back to it soon.

Even though our projects are way behind schedule I’m still keeping my eye out for items that I need to complete the finished look. If anyone knows of any great sites to get glass door knobs I’d really appreciate it.

I really like them, and our house came with a couple of them – on doors that we are no longer using. When I put in a new door to our basement and perhaps one between the kitchen and dinning room I’d like them to be glass – French doors with glass door knobs. Unfortunately the two glass door knobs that we do have don’t match.

What we have been doing is going to the local Habitat For Humanity store that’s pretty close to here and having a look around for glass door knobs. We’ve also been watching for garage sales – sometimes people sell their door knobs at yard sales. Plus, whenever it’s garbage day we watch for people to throw out old doors. We haven’t found one yet, but someday we might find an old door with a glass door knob on it and we’ll just remove the door knob if we do.

Any other ideas?

Down Bedding Sale at DownDeals.com

April 16, 2007 by Tricia

I keep saying that spring is the time of year when I and many others start to not only do our spring cleaning, or begin home renovation projects, but it’s also the time to get great deals on some of the items that we can’t live without during the cool winter months.

Yeah, that’s right. It’s the time for clearance and closeout sales. Of course, DownDeals.com is no exception to this rule as they too are having closeout and clearance sales on their bedding items. If you like to sleep in comfort, be surrounded by cozy soft warmth you should check out their Down Bedding Sale. Shipping is free if your order is over $50, and there’s also a coupon code near the top of the main page that will save you 25% on your down comforter purchases.

Not interested? Do you think down comforters and other down items are too hot? I guess you haven’t heard that you can buy items that give different levels of warmth. You’ll never be too hot under a down comforter again if you select the right warmth level with the sites special search tool. You can also use their search tool to select the correct pillow density if you are interested in buying some down filled pillows for your bedroom set.

I haven’t had a down comforter in years, but with the fevers that I get all the time, and air-conditioning in the summer perhaps I should get a down filled comforter. I could use it year round whenever I feel chilly.

Down comforters, pillows and other bedding related items would make a great gift too, especially since these items are on sale now. Check it out.

Remodel, blog and win contest!

April 16, 2007 by Tricia

Show of hands … How many of you enjoy doing Do It Yourself projects? It could be anything from painting a room, perhaps using an interesting painting technique like sponging or venetian plaster like I did. Or perhaps you’ve refinished your basement? Maybe your project involved tearing out a wall in a room and re-dry walling? Putting in a sky light? Re-finishing your kitchen, installing ceramic tile backsplash, Re-finishing antiques? Being creative and taking something old and worn and painting it or adding trim and making it into something new and functional?

Well, for those of you who have planned projects and hired someone to complete the job, or have a past, present or future do it yourself remodeling project you might be very interested in visiting RemodelingMySpace.com. Not only does this site aim to be your one stop place for just about everything to do with remodeling from How To video’s and articles, to scores of resources, but they are currently holding a contest.

This is an ideal contest for anyone who is planning or currently involved in a remodeling job.

The contest is called “Remodel, Blog and Win” and the grand prize winner will win $5,000 dollars! I’m going to tell you all about the contest, but I just wanted to let those of you who are not doing any remodeling projects that you too can win $250 by registering to vote in the contest.

Are you having a baby or have you already had one? Did you spend time fixing up the babies room? Yes? Well guess what – that’s a remodeling project.

As many of you know I’m a true do it yourselfer. I love renovating and doing projects to improve my home and garden. I know that many of you have mentioned your own past, present and future remodeling projects on this site whenever I’ve discussed my own. I hope that many of you will consider entering this fantastic contest.

Contest Benefits for Bloggers

This is a contest that delivers. Even if you don’t end up being the grand prize winner you can still reap many rewards just by entering:

1. YOU COULD WIN $5000! If you’re the grand prize winner

2. “People’s Choice” Award of $1000

3. Increased Exposure For Your Blog – This remodeling contest will be heavily promoted throughout the duration of the contest, and having entered – your site will be listed on the blog contestant’s list. This will generate exposure for your site and increase your sites traffic as homeowners, bloggers, and press visit your site to see your entry.

4. Increased Traffic For Your Blog – The public will be voting on entrants for the Peoples Choice Award, and this will cause registered and non-registered voters to visit your site in order to cast their vote, so this is another way that this contest will boost your sites traffic.

5. Link Juice For Your Blog – As I said earlier once you enter the contest there will be a link to your site posted on the Remodeling My Space site. One of the rules of the contest is that you must link to one of the sites resources that you thought was helpful for your project. There will be a lot of links going back and forth from contestants, the sites and other sites that discuss the contest like I’m doing now. Occasionally some of the contestants blogs will be linked to in order to highlight their project and blog postings.

6. Meet Other Bloggers Not In Your Niche

7. Create Valuable Content For Your Blog

8. Elevate Your Creative Mojo

9. Learn New Stuff With Our Tools

10. Get Inspired To Get Work Done Around The House!

11. contractors.com will also be cross promoting the site and thus your blog entries.

Now, I’ve only summarized a few of the ways that this contest will be beneficial to those who enter. Please visit the site to read more about the contest benefits for bloggers.

So what are the rules and how do you enter?

Now, if I list all of the information about entering and the rules here, this article will be far too long. I’m just going to highlight some of the important information that you should know, and you can continue to read the rest of the contest information at Remodel My Space.

This is a contest for anyone who has already started a remodeling project or who is about to start one. Everyone will have a chance to win. The judging criteria for the grand prize is based on creativity in both your actual remodeling project and how you go about showing your projects progress on your blog. Your budget, or the amount of resources available to you doesn’t factor in to the judging criteria. Creativity is key.

The contest began at midnight March 1st, 2007, and it will end at 11:59:59 p.m. EST on Friday, August 24, 2007. Contest winners will be announced Saturday September 1st, 2007. Public voting and automatic entry into the random voter draw will begin at 12:00:01 a.m. EST on Friday, May 1, 2007, or once they have 100 contestants – whichever comes first.

Entries can consist of projects and blog postings that began before the contests start date.

The grand prize of $5000 will be judged by a judging panel made up of 6 judges. 3 of the judges will be blogging experts, and 3 will be home improvement experts. The judges haven’t been announced yet, but they will be listed at least 30 days before the contest deadline.

Entries will be judged for best use of space, best use of materials, as in choices in decorating with color, and best use of your available budget for the project. Whether your project is big or small, done on an interior or exterior room it will be eligible for entry into the contest.

You can complete your project on your own, work as a team, or hire a professional contractor to complete your project.

Now to enter the contest you have to be able to show the judges and all the voters what your project looks like, perhaps even a step by step, start to finish article or series of posts. RemodelMySpace.com would like you to show your entries via blogs. If you don’t have a blog yet, no worries, you can take a look at their list of free blogging resources and start a blog or page at sites like MySpace, Blogger, or WordPress just to name a few.

Your blog posts will be judged for “Best use of blog space” as in – is your story an interesting read? Inclusion of pictures, images and videos including before and after pictures are encouraged. So is explaining your projects steps, what materials you used and how you used them. Did you tell your readers about resources you used to plan your project or about sites that inspired your design?

The Peoples Choice Award of $1000 US will go to the contestant with the highest number of votes.

As I mentioned earlier there will also be a prize of $250 for a random voter. Register on the site to vote in the contest to gain eligibility.

There’s already been a few great entries into the contest. Want to check out your potential competition or just get some great ideas for a future project? Visit the contest entries page.

One of the entrants – Grassroots Modern – is an all round great blog for those looking for modern renovation ideas. They have an ongoing kitchen remodeling project and they are keeping their readers up to date with postings on their progress.

Another contestant to visit would be Carley Brook Farm. This site has some great posts about planning your budget for a remodeling project, and fantastic “how to” articles. Check out their posts about frozen winter pipes, old plaster walls, and scraping painted wall paper. This is definitely a site to bookmark if you are doing a lot of work on your home and want to read about the trials and triumphs of others before you tackle your own project.

The last entrant I’ll discuss is 10K kitchen remodel. Almost everyone becomes interested in remodeling their kitchen at some point. I certainly belong in that group, and I’m interested in doing it as inexpensively as possible which of course means I’m going to get my own hands dirty. The owners of 10k kitchen remodel would also like to complete their kitchen remodeling project for a reasonably low cost of only 10K. That’s a tight budget for a complete kitchen remodel but it can be done, and this site will show you how they are managing to remodel their kitchen without spending too much money.

Are you up to the challenge? I think this is a worthwhile contest, and I’m certain that many of you would qualify for some aspect of this contest. Please do visit the site and read all of the contest information. There’s nothing complicated about the contest, and of course there are a lot of benefits as far as site promotion goes for all of the bloggers who enter too.

But wait! There’s more!

As for the RemodelingMySpace site itself? If you are working on, or planning any kind of remodeling projects, you simply must visit this site. I could easily write another one or two posts about this site as it’s just chock full of free resources. You’ll find all kinds of how to articles and ideas, photo galleries full of design ideas, how to and do it yourself videos, and useful tools like the remodeling cost estimator, and measurement conversion tools.

RemodelingMySpace also has free software downloads like Googles 3D remodeling software. Then there’s the online home value estimator.

Plus for those of you who are not DIY’ers there’s the contractor finder/locator. You can find a contractor for just about any kind of remodeling work pretty much anywhere in North America using contractors.com contractor finder. There are listings for contractors who build home additions, decks and porches, kitchen, basement and bathroom renovations and many more. Use the Contractor finder/locator search tool on RemodelingMySpace’s front page to find a contractor that suits your needs in your area.

I really could go on and on about this site. RemodelingMySpace.com has a motto and it’s “The Best Ideas Come From Sharing…”. They live up to their motto. Their site is so full of information that I don’t think they will have any trouble becoming the authority site for anyone who’s planning any kind of renovation or remodeling project. I’ve already bookmarked the site, and I’m going to link to it in my blogroll for easy reference as well. That’s how strongly I feel about this sites importance as a top resource for DIY’ers. There’s a wealth of information within the site. I urge you to begin exploring now.

Browsing Bestpricedfurniture.com for redecorating ideas

April 9, 2007 by Tricia

Spring has me in it’s grip and I think I’m starting to go stir crazy. I want to get out and work in my garden but we’ve had a spell of cool weather so I can’t really get out there and do too much just yet. Instead, my mind has started working on our reno projects.

With any luck we’ll have our living room and dining room reno finished this year. Yes, I said this year. I’d love to say it will be finished in a week or two but every time I do say that it doesn’t happen. However, it had better happen before the end of the year! LOL

Being optimistic that our living room and dining room will be complete soon, I’ve started to think about how I might redecorate. Co-incidentally I’ve been asked to write an article of an online store called Best Priced Furniture. Great timing!

I like the way that the Bestpricedfurniture.com site is laid out. It’s very easy to shop for different types of furniture or office items by browsing the categories listed on the left hand side of the page. You could also select any of the tabs at the top of each page to reach customer service, do an advanced search for a particular item, or browse the sites best sellers and clearance items.

One of the items that I’ve been keeping my eye out for ever since we purchased this house has been bar stools. We haven’t begun this portion of our living room/dining room reno, but we’d like to cut out a portion of the wall between the kitchen and dining room. I don’t know what you’d call that sort of design but I guess when it’s complete it would look like an open serving window between the two rooms.

If we do this I’d like to place a wide enough counter in the cut out area so that it could be used for serving dishes easily, and also to create a place where a couple of people could perhaps sit on bar stools and eat breakfast or brunch and perhaps even talk with someone in the kitchen as they work.

Now, one reason why we haven’t already picked up a couple of bar stools for this future serving area is because we’ve been very picky about the look of the stools. We just haven’t found anything that we’ve liked so far. That might have changed!

Take a look at the Montello Swivel bar stool that I just found at Best Priced Furniture. The bar stools would be in the dining room and we have a 1920’s era dining room set – table, chairs, and buffet – and this style of bar stool would look lovely with the antique dining room set.

If you are thinking of redecorating a room, getting a new bed or bedroom set have a look at BestPricedFurniture.com. I’m certain that you’ll be pleased with the quality and variety of the furniture items that they sell. Oh and don’t forget – they don’t just sell furnishings for the home. You can purchase office furnishings at their online store as well as patio furniture and rugs.

Our home reno project du jour

Looking for glass door knobs

Down Bedding Sale at DownDeals.com

Remodel, blog and win contest!

Browsing Bestpricedfurniture.com for redecorating ideas

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